Tim Phillips, not particularly relishing his Boris Johnson moment, sheepishly brandished the flag bearing the Masters logo, celebrating the official handover of this championship from China to the spiritual capital of tennis. Behind the chairman of the All England Club, everyone smiled warmly, but none beamed from ear to ear more widely than Novak Djokovic.

Having won the first grand-slam title of the year, the Australian Open, which confirmed the 21-year-old Serb’s ascent from contender to a true champion, Djokovic rounded off another arduous campaign with a victory in the Masters Cup final in Shanghai yesterday. Djokovic defeated Nikolay Davydenko, of Russia, 6-1, 7-5, with a display of power hitting that underscored his determination to end 2008 on a high.

But even with his successes early in the year — he won both the Masters in Indian Wells on hard courts and in Rome on clay — the focus of the tennis world in recent months had turned to the rivalry between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray’s considerable resurgence.

What happened in the last Masters final at the Qizhong Stadium was Djokovic’s “remember me?” moment. If his route to the final was less than emphatic even though he topped his group and dropped his guard only against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga — the Frenchman who beat Djokovic when he had already been eliminated — the final was a performance of conviction and redoubtable ball-striking.

Poor Davydenko, having profited from Murray’s lack of energy after the Scot’s superb win over Federer in the semi-finals, was pinned back for such long periods that when he managed to break Djokovic, when the Serb first served for the title, he placed his hand across his forehead as if embarrassed to be making a match of it. The crowd roared their approval, so much so that when Djokovic immediately broke Davydenko, he jutted out his jaw and nodded vigorously in the direction of the Russian’s cheerleaders.

It was not long before they were silenced altogether and Davydenko was soon pouring praise on his conqueror. “He played very fast and very good, almost perfect in the first set. He did that, I didn’t,” he said. Davydenko also bemoaned the fact that he found it hard to focus as the match progressed, saying it was “difficult to be positive at 5-0 down”.

Not only did Djokovic win the Masters Cup — as he put it, “I regard this as just as good as a major” — but he also left the arena seated next to what the Serb described as “a former Miss Universe, 2006”, Leryn Franco, the Paraguay athlete, in a Mercedes R500, his prize. Some would say the man is blessed.